Thursday to Monday, April 2 to 6, 2015 (Monck Provincial Park, Quilchena, BC)

Our official start day here at Monck Provincial Park isn't until April 15, so we have some time to get settled in, relax a bit, take daily walks around the campground...and generally get used to our new "home away from home".

Thursday, we started off with a morning walk...beautiful blue sky, but chilly. The low's overnight have gone down to -5C/23F. The day use area is also an archaeological site. This is one of two First Nations pit house depressions in the area...

Once we got back Steve got his chain saw out and after a little coaxing, it started and he bucked up some old downed trees that were stacked beside the firewood pile. Doug helped him stack it.

Although not "officially" working yet, the guys changed a flat tire on one of the golf carts...

We enjoyed happy hour around the campfire and then it was dinner time. I made turkey lasagna and salad...Toni brought buns and desert...and we all sat at the picnic table next door at Sue and Doug's...a total group effort. It's nice that the six of us have time to spend together before it's "time to get to work"!

Left to right...Doug and Toni, Sue and Doug...and me....

Friday we took a trip with Doug and Sue to Kamloops, about 100 kms/60 miles north. There's still ice on the lakes in the higher elevations along the Coquihalla (highway 5).

We did some shopping at Costco, filled up the water containers at a local station and then went to Montana's for lunch. After a stop at the liquor store (I made a quick run into Save-on-Foods), we were back home shortly after 3:00. Thanks for including us on your trip to Costco, Doug and Sue!

Saturday morning we took another walk around the campground...Doug and Tucker joined us...

 Tucker found "his" stick...

...and loves the water!

The afternoon was spent in front of the TV watching a hockey game...the Vancouver Canucks were playing the Winnipeg Jets. Unfortunately, the Canucks lost.

Sunday we thought we would go for a hike on the Monck Park Trail. So with cameras, my GPS to check for geocaches, binoculars, plenty of water and me with my walking stick...we headed off. We walked up the hill to the park entrance and crossed the road to the trailhead...

And up and up we went...

 A small creek running down the hillside...

We took the East Loop trail...

Great views! That's the park entrance down below...

We went as far as a park bench and got a little confused about the direction the trail was going as it seemed to peter out, so we decided to turn around and go back down and take the other trail.

A telephoto shot of the day-use area at the park...there's some folks enjoying time out from their boat...

When we came to the junction with the other end of the East Loop, we took it and went (up and up)...

We found a geocache!

We crossed a stream...

And continued up...

...until we could look down and see the bench where we had turned around. We realized that the East Trail obviously carries on making a much bigger loop than we expected. The trail map made it look like the bench was right on the trail but the trail past the bench petered out...so obviously, the bench was on it's own separate little trail off the main trail.

Back down at the junction of trails, we took the West Loop Trail...

I set waypoints on my GPS where we came upon 8 downed trees across the trail and Steve took pictures. We'll give the information to Doug and Toni so they can relay the information to the parks people to have it cleared (we're actually doing a little "work" while out on our hike!)...

Osprey (?) nest...

Telephoto shot of the Quilchena Hotel RV Park and Golf Course across the lake...

...the 9 hole golf course...

There are a number of park benches along the trail...

 The trail went back down to the road...and continued on the other side...

The campground has come into view where the shoreline juts out...

Poison Ivy...no thanks!

When we got back, Doug and Sue had a campfire going...awesome! We were ready to sit down and rest...what a great hike! Only about 5.3 kms/ 3.3 miles but a good portion of it was uphill! Later that night while watching TV Steve found a tick crawling on his chest and a few minutes later I found one in my hair! Gifts from our hike.

Monday was a pretty quiet day. We did our daily walk around the campground and I did a little baking. We spent most of the afternoon researching and reading...and booking a vacation to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico for this December. We both turn 60 this year and decided we wanted to do something special...so 2 weeks in a 5-Star beachfront resort it is!

And that pretty well brings us up-to-date...enjoying a relaxing time here before it's time to get to work. By the way, while we are stationary in one spot for the spring/summer, I will not be posting daily blogs...not sure how often, likely weekly updates, but we'll see how it goes and what each day brings.